Leaving that lonely little grave behind them, they hurried on to their new home.  Springfield, the capital of the State, was but a small collection of shanties and log huts, and Sangamon County was the extreme frontier.  It was the most northern county of Illinois, and just beyond it lay the unbroken Indian country.  Numbers of Indians roamed through the Sangamon River bottom, and spent their winters there.  It was as wild and unsettled a region as our preacher could have desired, and one which gave him a fine field for the exercise of his peculiar abilities.  Mr. Cartwright was promptly received into the Indiana Conference, and he lost no time in looking about him.  He at once established his family in their new home, and then set about his work.  The work was hard, and money was scarce.  The first year he traveled the Sangamon Circuit he received forty dollars, and the next year sixty dollars, which he says was a great improvement in his financial affairs.  He was successful from the first, and in the two years referred to added one hundred and sixty persons to the Methodist Church in this thinly settled district.  For forty-six years he has labored in this region, adding many souls to the kingdom of God.

Arduous as his labors had been in the Kentucky Conference, they now increased very greatly.  He had a larger amount of territory to travel over, people were more scattered, and the dangers to be encountered were greater.  In 1827, he was made presiding elder, and given the Illinois District, then a very extensive region, and in 1828 Galena charge was added to this district.  The district thus enlarged extended from the mouth of the Ohio River to Galena, the entire length of the present State of Illinois, and over this immense distance our preacher was obliged to travel four times in the year.  The journeys were made either on horseback or in an old-fashioned sulky or one-seat gig.  There were miles of lonely prairie and many rapid streams to cross, and roads, bridges, or ferry-boats were almost unknown.  Yet Peter Cartwright was not the man to be deterred by obstacles.  When he set out on his official journeys, he allowed nothing that it was possible to overcome to prevent him from keeping his appointments.  In crossing the prairies, he would guide himself by the points of timber, for there were no roads over these vast plains.  Oftentimes the streams to be crossed were swollen, and then he would swim his horse across them, or ride along the shore until he found a tree fallen over the current.  Stripping himself, he would carry his clothes and riding equipments to the opposite bank, and then, returning, mount his horse and swim him across the river.  Dressing again, he would continue his journey, and perhaps repeat the proceeding several times during the day.  When overtaken by night, he would seek a place in some grove, and, lighting a fire with his tinder-box and steel, tie up his horse, and, throwing himself on the ground, sleep as peacefully